Bere Alston

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Bere Alston is a small village in the county of Devon, United Kingdom.

With a population of approximately 2000, the village lies in the Bere peninsula, between the rivers Tamar and Tavy. Its origins lie in the once thriving local mining industry and market gardening sector. At one time, the mainline trains to London would stop at the village to pick up locally grown produce destined for the capital.

Trains still run to the village on the picturesque Tamar Valley line, and there has been discussion of making the town a junction once again by reopening the former 'main line' to Tavistock, the largest town in Devon currently without a railway station. Occasionally reopening the whole line through to Okehampton and Exeter is suggested, since the current Plymouth-Exeter route is dependent on an extremely vulnerable route below the sea cliffs at Dawlish Warren.

Bere Alston elected two members to the Unreformed House of Commons, the electorate being only a few burgage holders. Elections to the seat were never contested (see rotten borough) and it was stripped of its franchise in the Reform Act 1832.